First thoughts on Technical Preview 1701 for System Center Configuration Manager

A few days ago Microsoft made technical preview 1701 for SCCM available for download. Here are my first thoughts on this technical preview (TP).

Boundary groups improvements for software update pointsIn CB 1610 Microsoft introduced important changes to boundary groups and how they worked with Distribution Points. With TP 1701 they are taking it a step further by adding the Software Update Points role. With TP 1701 you will be able to manage which SUP a client can use and which SUP’s it can use as fallback depending on which DP it’s connected to.

Please take note that the fallback time is not yet fully supported therefor it can take upon 2 hours before a client will use it’s fallback SUP.

This feature will be more than welcome for a client I am working with at the moment. They’ve got multiple DP’s across the country with slow WAN’s The possibility to decide which boundary group is using which SUP and fallback SUP will be a great addition.

Hardware inventory collects UEFI informationThis new feature is enabled by default when TP 1701 is installed. A new inventory class (SMS_Firmware) and property (UEFI) will be filled. The UEFI property will be set to TRUE when a computer is started in UEFI mode. This will probably be useful in some circumstances when u want to know if a device or more devices use UEFI or Legacy BIOS to boot up.

Improvements to OS deployment
Microsoft listened to the community for most of these improvements. Lets see what they are and what they can do for us.

Support for more application for the install Application task sequence step:
The number of applications you can add to this step have been increased to 99 applications. Previous count was 9 applications. I still prefer using packages for my task sequences so as long as we can still use packages I probably won’t be using applications within my OSD task sequence. And I’ve never been in the situation that I needed to use them in my task sequence. That said I believe for those who do and maybe for future use it’s a good improvement.

Expire standalone media:It will be possible to optionally set start and expiration dates when you create standalone media. This will be needed when you want to expire certain deployments through standalone media when you don’t want the media to be used after and before a certain date. I don’t use standalone media that much but I can imagine it ill be useful when for example deploying certain software or operating systems for a specific time frame and you don’t want it to be used in a later stadium or before a specific date.

Support for additional content in stand-alone media:It used to be only possible to add content which was referenced to the task sequence while creating standalone media. With TP 1701 it will be possible to add additional packages, driver packages and applications on the media. This could come in handy when u want to launch additional software and/or scripts after the task sequence is ended. I can imagine combining this with a script launched by the “SMSpostAction” feature which was added in SCCM 2012 R2 a while ago. I wrote a blogpost (link) about this variable which you can set during your task sequence.

Configurable timeout for Auto Apply Driver task sequence step:
I almost never use the step “Auto Apply Drivers” within a task sequence. I prefer using a tool from the hardware supplier for installing drivers. This way the drivers are installed the way it’s meant to be installed by the supplier. Most big hardware suppliers like DELL, HP and Fujitsu have their own SCCM or command line tooling for installing their drivers. But if you don’t have a choice and/or you prefer to use this step Microsoft added a foursome variables to timeout this step, values are in seconds.

SMSTSDriverRequestResolveTimeOut Default: 60

SMSTSDriverRequestConnectTimeOut Default: 60

SMSTSDriverRequestSendTimeOut Default: 60

SMSTSDriverRequestReceiveTimeOut Default: 480

Package ID is now displayed in the task sequence step:
Any task sequence step that references a package, driver package, operating system image, boot image, or operating system upgrade package will now display the package ID of the referenced object. When a task sequence step references an application it will display the object ID. This is a great feature, I really love this. This will make troubleshooting the task sequence easier and its just a small change. You don’t have to search for the specific ID first before you go search in your logs. I see myself combining this with the variable “SMSTSErrorDialogTimeout” set to 0 (forever) so I can quickly see which package/object ID is involved when my task sequence is failing.

Windows 10 ADK tracked by build version:
For example if the site has Windows ADK for Windows 10, version 1607 installed, you won’t be able to edit boot images other than 10.0.014393 in the SCCM console. I can imagine that this will become less practicable when you want to troubleshoot with different versions of boot image versions.

Default boot image source path can no longer be changed:
I always use custom boot images and it will still be possible to adjust the source path for custom boot images. I see no problems with this adjustment and I think it will be a nice addition that you can always find your default boot images on a fixed location.

Host software updates on cloud-based distribution points
Since you can download software updates directly from Microsoft Update this new feature isn’t that appealing. But I believe the feature set for cloud-based distribution points will grow in the near future and it will become more practicable to use cloud-based distribution points in the future.

Validate device health attestation data via management points
“Beginning with this preview version, you can configure management points to validate health attestation reporting data for cloud or on-premises health attestation service. A new Advanced Options tab in the Management Point Component Properties dialog box lets you Add, Edit, or Remove the On-premises device health attestation service URL.”
I haven’t used DHA before and it was first introduced in Windows 10 version 1507. For more information about DHA I suggest to read the following Microsoft Article (link).

Use the OMS connector for Microsoft Azure Government cloud
With this technical preview, you can now use the Microsoft Operations Management Suite (OMS) connector to connect to an OMS workspace that is on Microsoft Azure Government cloud. I love OMS, nothing more to add.

Android an iOS versions are no longer targetable in creation wizards for hybrid MDMBeginning in this technical preview for hybrid mobile device management (MDM), you no longer need to target specific versions of Android and iOS when creating new policies and profiles for Intune-managed devices. Instead, you choose one of the following device types:

Android

Samsung KNOX Standard 4.0 and higher

iPhone

iPad

It’s always nice to see things get more simplified and this is one of them!

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Disclaimer

This is a personal weblog. The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer.
In addition, my thoughts and opinions change from time to time…I consider this a necessary consequence of having an open mind. This weblog is intended to provide a semi-permanent point in time snapshot and manifestation of the various memes running around my brain, and as such any thoughts and opinions expressed within out-of-date posts may not the same, nor even similar, to those I may hold today.